by Kathe Koja
And Lisi leaping predator, stunning the other woman with a blow across the back: vicious and inexpert, so hard the other fell and points lit up on the scoreboard; another bell rang and Lisi hit her again, this time in the stomach, muscles and sinew, bone and bone, and hit her again, driving her back against the ropes, hit her harder, and Tommy was screaming, head back and screaming, and everyone was screaming, laughter and cheers as more points rang up, Lisi mouth-open and breathing like an animal, speed glare, and the other woman made some small attempts, feeble swing here and there, but it was Lisi’s game and she knew it, they both knew it: relentless that advance as if it was—I knew—Martin she battered, Martin she struck: sweat on her back, on her arms and her face in that Noh grimace, squared mouth, and Tommy chanting, laughing, banging his bottle on the table, and I wanted to scream at her, climb into the ring and grab her arms and stop it, stop it, but I did nothing, said nothing, only turned in my seat to see, observe Martin at the bar: Martin who was barely watching, Martin who as I watched turned away—
—and I was out of my seat then, no conscious plan, and through the crowd, all faced away, faced toward the ring and the ringing bells, and “Mike,” Martin said to me, next to me, an almost-friendly nod past his girlfriend’s gaze indifferent, “hey Mike, how’s it going?” Black jeans, black leather jacket, one arm around his girlfriend’s waist; Lisi in the ring, and “Fine,” I said, my heart in curious motion, red surge in my chest as the scoreboard bell rang again; two guys on Martin’s other side laughed out loud. “I’m fine. How do you like the show?”
“What, Lisi?” and his shrug and smile, something about a joke and a challenge, he’d never meant her to take it all so seriously, she was such a serious person, and then something said to the girlfriend, something private in her ear, and as she laughed—
I hit him
—without thinking, my body in motion, hit him once and then again as his girlfriend shrieked and threw her drink at me, glass and liquid, and I hit him again—in the face, in the mouth, in the teeth—before someone, bouncers, pulled me off and away, pulled me outside where they pushed me against the wall and punched me, chest and belly where no bruises would show.
• • •
Three minutes is a very long time.
• • •
Thursday, this coming Thursday, is my court date; the lawyer they gave me thinks it won’t be a problem, simple assault with no priors, Romeo defense, and he laughed a little but stopped when I didn’t laugh along. I don’t think it’s funny; I don’t think any of it is funny. Last night at the Vault I saw Lisi, with Tommy; she was drunk and they were dancing, and kissing; Martin was there, too, with a different girlfriend, but he didn’t see me. Lisi didn’t see me either, or if she did, she pretended not to.
It’s not as if I liked it, any of it, hitting him; hurting him. But I wouldn’t have stopped if they hadn’t stopped me; and I think I could do it again.
URB CIV
Here, you—you, Selma—
Mr. Bertrand, uh, her name is Salma—
What? Be quiet, you, newbie—the sudden flick of a bead of flux, molten and dripping, he jerks back his arm just in time—Selma, Salma, show them, the old man offering the ancient welding wand that Salma accepts with one dexterous hand, flipping the green eye-guard down with the other, demonstrating to the class clustered behind the steel worktable how to mend a spankbot’s broken arm. At the table’s head the old man watches, right eye in perpetual squint, right arm clumsy to dig in his jacket pocket for what, for a contraband cigarette that Salma lights for him with a soldering gun: Merci, to her, then You see? to the rest, a brief scowl aimed his way, see how she did? Good work! Next, we gonna fix up a dragonfly.
And Salma nods, he nods, they all nod: two women, six men, motorbike roughriders and teenage malcontents, shaved heads and black-wrapped braids and a wispy purple beard, all the students of this cold late afternoon, but Smoke break first, says Mr. Bertrand, carefully checking the street before heading for the stairs, his tread heavy and uneven, like a machine on the verge of breaking down—
—want to come? and it takes a moment, a wasted moment, to realize Salma is talking to him—Me? Sure! Sure, I’ll go—then follow her down, past four grim floors of pinch locks and accordion gates, repurposed security flats, a squatters’ stronghold under permanent siege, and The Gunnysackers, says Salma over her shoulder, used to have, like, the whole second floor here. You heard of them, right?
Sure. They were a rebel army, holding the heavy blast door for her to exit, into the alley with its lone bulging trash bin, out to the street’s winter sun where he shivers inside his waterproof parka; Salma in her nylon anorak seems unaffected, and Bertrand knew them, she says, nodding toward the old man standing now at the corner, hunched and wary as a sentinel, Mr. Bertrand whose school has always been the go-to place, the place to learn how to build and burn, hack a sex toy, defy the government. Bertrand knows everybody. Ask him sometime about his friend the poet, the one who broke off a citizen cuff—
Broke a cuff? That couldn’t have happened.
It did happen. Lightstick fished from a kangaroo pocket, she offers him a cigarette, he shakes his head; blowing smoke, her throat is smooth and brown as buckwheat honey. He broke it off and got away.
The citizen cuffs were unbreakable—
They say dragonflies are unbreakable, too, white smile around the yellowed cigarette, but Material flaw, he says firmly. The dragonfly design is flawless, only the material can fail—
You’re sticking up for a dragonfly? one eye screwed shut, right eye, like Bertrand’s—and then she smiles again, a joking smile because it must be a joke, who would stick up for dragonflies, and the police state that launches them, their lasers and tasers, and Flawless design, he says, with a smile of his own, half a feint, half at that skin, those hazel eyes below the fireproof bandana, Salma like a princess in welder’s drag. You have to give credit where credit’s due.
Is that how they do it uptown?
Uptown? No, no actually I’m from Montréal—
Canada? they still have that? another joke, waiting for his smile in return, then Montréal, she says, that’s a long way away. How’d you wind up here? as a cough booms, Mr. Bertrand’s ugly and wet, no wonder cigarettes are illegal! but Salma drags deep, waiting for his answer, so I came from school, he says. My master’s in Urb Civ—placement derangement, but it’s really about how things work together. Or fall apart—
You mean like this, her backhand gesture to the building, the scorched and boarded block: a storefront mosque and silent tavern, old transit shelter grayed out by years of vandalism, sharp piss smell even in this cold. My degree’s in folklore studies . . . I bet your profs never saw anything like this in real life.
You bet right, which is exactly why he came here, why he volunteered for active service—call it spying, call it infiltration, without boots on the ground nothing will ever change. And this place, this city, is overdue for change, for rescue, black rings of decay around all the world’s cities like a fable of rot and danger, the dark forest strangling the fair castle; folklore, sure. I wanted to see if I could help, so instead of wasting time in grad school, I came here.
Do you like it here?
What do you mean? and when she does not answer, It’s a great city in some ways, thinking of where he stays, the quiet dormlike apartment uptown: there are other agents in the building, he knows, though none of them know each other or each other’s names, even at university they never knew each other’s names. In his neighborhood the sidewalks are busy and the trains are mainly clean, the tea kiosks on the corners are clean, the signs and billboards advertise products that, on this street, a person would be jumped or worse for even having. It’s better than where I came from—not Montréal after all but New Miami, where the security still depends on drones, slow and clunky as an old man stumping downstairs: nothing like these dragonflies, fast an
d accurate, nearly silent, once you hear it, it’s already deployed . . . The first time he saw one here he nearly gasped: that something so useful and lethal could be so beautiful, too.
You ever been to Pumptown? That’s where I live.
By the, the water treatment plants—People live there? You live there?
A lot of us do, nodding toward the building, Jorge does, and his sister . . . It’s kind of rough, but at least you can drink the water, right? And the river’s right there, you get a nice breeze on warm nights—it’s pretty.
Pretty? with such flat disbelief that she laughs, and The old sodium lights, she says, they shine orange, like a harvest moon. And when the sharks come out—
Sharks—
The kayakers, sketching a shape in the air, strange beast, a bullet with fins. They race bank to bank, like shadows, they go so fast—
Isn’t that prohibited? To be on the water?
Prohibited? Yeah. This, flicking ash, is prohibited too. So is Bertrand, so are we, and she gives him a gentle push, nudge, shoulder to shoulder, so close he can smell her, past the cigarette stink her skin is like soap and flowers, and How did you know my name? with a different kind of smile, and I asked that one kid, with the beard, looking at her then away, as if clumsy, abashed, but You, she says, could have asked me.
He says nothing, formulating the best answer, best response—because Salma is why he came here, to befriend her, learn what he can from her, all the tactics and plans; and turn her if he can, turn her the right way, and her friends with her, the kid with the beard, Jorge, who is Jorge—and A folklore degree, he says at last, bantering, nudging back. What can you do with a folklore degree? to bring her shrug: “All learning comes to use,” that’s what my professor used to say. And folklore is history, right, it’s based in—
History? History’s over, it’s dead. This is what’s real, recalling with scorn his own professors’ toothless classroom philosophies, their fantasies of block-by-block reclamation, gentrification, like posh blinds on smashed windows, their dither and dismay at the steep rise in state security, the surrender of personal freedom—but what if they saw this city up close? Freedom! like illegal kayaks racing in filthy water, dirty waste canisters rolling loose at the curbs, in the subway—on his way here today, on the train, he sat reading or trying to read as a man in a hat with plastic bull’s horns slumped next to him, squirming and panting, masturbating? having a seizure? but no security available, no one there to make it stop: so he got off at the next stop but the next train was nowhere, the arrival display pulsing and falsing, unreadable runes, so he headed for the stairs, as sounds assailed him from the shadows, sly and sourceless, something like footsteps but not footsteps, three-legged, what walks like that? and who on the platform to ask for help? No transit police, no buzzbox to push, nothing to do but shine his phone in the direction of the sounds, and I can see you, he called, loud, lying, voice too high, I’m recording you! And be answered with nothing but a mocking silence, a metallic chuckle that turned out to be another canister, waste canister, rolling drunkenly toward him, to fall with a hollow thunk on the tracks, an invisible hazard to any oncoming train—and he hurrying up to the street again, to the breakage and emptiness, the roaming trashhawks with their sagging sacks and sharp sticks, the trucker-fuckers who flash themselves to any passing vehicle, down to this building where the blast door wears an ugly red glyph that means, who knows what it means? folklore, some sign from history, here be monsters? Does Salma understand what this school, this “learning,” is about?
And what if he took her to his building, his quiet street lined by containment walls, firm blue blast-resistant concrete, and the clean new public park with its smart pickets, that waist-high white fencing that self-multiplies as needed, put down three and in an hour there are thirty, or three hundred, a thousand, some people call them dragon’s teeth; folklore again. And the dragonflies, what would folklore call them? everything but what they are, eyes to see and power to patrol, control, punish if need be, every legal citizen in this city should have one, like sleepless guardian angels: because in real live actual life, bad things happen that need to be punished, cities rot and die if they are not properly policed, professors are idiots and agents are recruited and rebels are removed so that one day cities, all the cities, this city, can be safe again, can be a place to live and not a place to fear, here be monsters—
—even in folklore. No one’s exempt, the heroes, the villains—she is talking, what is she saying, something about good and evil, some romantic’s fable, the anorak’s hood framing her face, princess in the gutter—then Hey, she says, voice changing, one hand on his arm. Are you OK?
I’m fine. He realizes he is shivering, a quick hard shudder, another. It’s just, it’s cold out here, cold enough, now, to snow, fresh spinning flakes from the clustering clouds, and upstairs will be nearly as cold, no real heat in this building or Mr. Bertrand’s rooms—
—as here comes Mr. Bertrand, crippled and slow, not long for this world, yet how much harm has he already done, how many have been trained in his lawless school with its Gunnysacker pedigree, its stolen tools and siphoned power, corrupting people like Salma who set out to do good? But no one is exempt from law, yes, or force, take a hex head screwdriver, and pop! goes an eye, the other eye, how many students can a blind man teach? If it were up to him—
And You trying to school him, too, this blockhead? Mr. Bertrand gruff to Salma, and then to him, The women are smarter, always, that’s why there’s five boys here for every girl. You keep watching, you’ll learn . . . Inside, inside now—
—as Salma holds the blast door, this time, for him, following close, companionably close, close enough to abruptly pivot then press him to the stairwell, her forearm hard against his throat, and Did you think, she says, her voice changing again, her face changing with it, like a mask removed, we didn’t know about you? Did you think we didn’t see you coming?
What—Wait, Salma, I don’t—
Canada my ass—
Salma no—as that strong arm presses, and presses, as he struggles against her, struggles for air, for freedom, as Mr. Bertrand holds the blast door closed, Mr. Bertrand who knows everybody, Mr. Bertrand watching as his eyes roll up and his knees give way, Salma’s arm harder still, like iron, like a machine, her face without expression, beautiful useful le
—for Carter Scholz
ON THE WAY
FIREFLIES
Look, he said. Look at all the stars.
Steep back steps, less porch than stoop, rusting wrought iron railing and barely room enough for two, but they had once been lovers, and so it was easy to sit touching, hip to thigh. His head back against the screen door mesh, looking up; on her right arm a fresh bandage, white and still, like a large moth waiting with folded wings.
They look like fireflies, she said. Awkward, left-handed, she lit a cigarette; without being asked, the man opened her bottle of beer, an Egyptian beer called Stella, star. He had just come back from Cairo; she was going somewhere else.
Fireflies? he said. He had a kind of accent, not foreign but not native either: unplaceable long vowels, sentences that curled up at the ends, like genie’s slippers, like the way they talk down south. One big backyard, to have fireflies that size?
Think of the grasshoppers, she said, and laughed, winced, dragged on her cigarette. The smoke rose in the darkness; it was very late. Or the dragonflies.
Or the June bugs, he said. His own beer was almost empty. What’d the doctor say?
She did not answer. The cement of the steps was damp, clammy against the backs of their legs; like a slab, a tomb, tombstone, and Esperson called, she said. He told me they were taking my paper.
The, the vacuum one? Oh honey that’s great! He pressed her leg, the bare skin below the edge of her cutoffs; his hand was warm, with long strong workman’s fingers, small hard spots like rivets on the palm, his skin a topographi
c map of his days: cut wood, carry water, name and number and know all the plants in the world. Sometimes she imagined him out there in the green aether of the woods, any woods: mending a split sapling, digging arbutus, testing the soil. He the earth, she the void, and When does it come out? he asked. When will you—
When do you leave again? she asked. Where are you going?
Montreal, he said, but not till December? or maybe the new year, I’m not sure. It depends on— It depends. When did Esperson say—
Look, she said, one hand out, her left hand with its tubed coal of cigarette. Fireflies; look. Above the dark drenched grass a ballet of on and off, little lights delicate, sturdy, irregular. From the porch, they watched together in silence, a long wondering silence; he put his hand on her leg again, and squeezed, but absently; he sees this all the time, she thought. In the woods.
Your paper, he said. Tell me what it’s about. In layman’s terms?
Shifting a little on the steps, trying not to move her right arm, and Basically, she said, it’s about how most of what’s out there, most of what’s here—tapping her chest—is vacuum energy. The cosmos is one-third visible and dark matter, two-thirds vacuum energy.
He flicked away an insect, a mosquito, some tiny night-borne pest. I thought nature abhors a vacuum?
This kind keeps the universe expanding, she said. It resists the gravitational pull of the galaxies, and so—
And what?
She said nothing.
What’s—hey, are you OK? Are you—
She did not answer; he looked into her face, peered through the darkness then at once looked away, his own mouth twisting down one-sided, like a stroke victim’s, its curve the felt echo of her pain, and You wan’ go in? he asked, voice soft with alarm, his accent more pronounced. You wan’ lie down, or—